Console video games

A console video game is a interactive entertainment computer or electronic device that manipulates the video display signal of a display device (a television, monitor, etc.) to display a game. The term video game console is used to distinguish a machine designed for consumers to buy and use solely for playing video games from a personal computer, which has many other functions, or arcade games, which are designed for businesses that buy and then charge others to play.

History

Magnavox Odyssey (1972)

The Magnavox Odyssey is the first home video game console, released in May 1972, predating the Atari PONG home consoles by three years. The Odyssey was designed by Ralph Baer. Unlike most video game consoles, the Odyssey is analog rather than digital. Also, unlike any conventional console today, this system was powered by batteries. The Odyssey and its variants also lack sound capability.

Atari Pong (1975)

In 1973, after the success of the original PONG coin-op, an Atari engineer by the name of Harold Lee came up with the idea of a home PONG unit. Since the PONG coin-op that Alan Alcorn designed was nothing more than the game board connected to an actual television set, he thought it would be possible to scale it down a bit and modify it for use at home. Released in 1975 in partnership with Sears stores, Sears would sell PONG under it's own specially created Tele-Games label.

Magnavox Odyssey 100 (1975)

The Odyssey 100 was an analog system. It did not use cartridges and played two games: Tennis and Hockey. A switch selected the games, and the system was either powered by six batteries, or by an AC adaptor. The Odyssey 100 was very basic and didn't have the common features of the million-seller PONG systems of the next years.

Magnavox Odyssey 200 (1975)

Magnavox released an improved version of the Odyssey 100: the Odyssey 200. It was same as the Odyssey 100 but with two additional chips from Texas Instruments, which added a third game called SMASH and some on-screen scoring. The Odyssey 200 could be played by two or four players (the first system to offer this feature), and displayed very basic on-screen scoring using small rectangles (it still had the two plastic cursors to record the scores). Each time a player marked a point, his white rectangle would shift on the right. The winner was obviously the first whose rectangle would reach the rightmost position on the screen. Although the scores were not yet digital, the Odyssey 200 remained more advanced than the first home version of Atari PONG because it played three different games for two or four players.

Atari Super Pong (1976)

Super Pong was a variation on the original PONG console that offered four different variations of the original pong concept.

Coleco Telstar (1976)

Telstar was released in 1976 and played only three games with three difficulty levels. It was the first system to use GI's AY-3-8500 chip and was deemed a success: over a million units were sold.

The AY-3-8500 chip played six games with more difficulty levels, and the games could also be played in color. At least 15 different games were released in two years with the only difference between the "pong" systems being the number of games, the addition of difficulty levels, and the type of picture(color or black and white).

Magnavox Odyssey 300 (1976)

Magnavox continued with the Odyssey 300 in 1976, which was one of the first system to use a single game chip containing the major circuitry of a PONG system.

Magnavox Odyssey 400 (1976)

The Magnavox Odyssey 400 played the same games than the Odyssey 200 and used an additional Texas Instruments chip to display digital on-screen scoring (it was the first analog Odyssey system to display digital on-screen scoring). Like the Odyssey 100 and 200, the Odyssey 400 used the same three knobs to move the bats and control the "English" effect on the ball.

Magnavox Odyssey 500 (1976)

The Odyssey 500 was very advanced for that time considering the technology used. The white paddles representing the players in a traditional Pong style game were replaced by simple color graphics: two tennis players with their rackets (TENNIS game), two squash players (SQUASH), or two hockey players holding their sticks (HOCKEY).

Fairchild Channel F (1976)

Fairchild released twenty-six different cartridges for the system, with up to four games on each cartridge. The games included sports, such as Hockey, Tennis and Baseball, educational, such as Math Quizzes, board games, such as Checkers, and shooting games, such as Space War. The cartridges had labels that contained the game instructions on them and each were given a sequential number. In this respect Fairchild started a trend in trying to boost game sales by numbering them and so appealing to consumers who wanted to complete their collection.

Atari Video Pinball (1977)

Video Pinball appeared as another Atari coin-op to stand-alone home console translation by bringing the game Breakout to home players. Bumper controllers on the sides or a dial on the front were used to control the games depending on the game selected. There were three game types - Pinball, Basketball, and Breakout.

Atari Stunt Cycle (1977)

Inspired by Evel Knievel, Stunt Cycle gave the player a first person feel of riding a motorcycle, even though the image on the screen wasn't first person. You could jump cars and buses, if you played with the controls just right you could jump right off the screen, lots of fun!

Atari VCS 2600 (1977)

The Atari 2600, released in 1977, is the first successful video game console to use plug-in cartridges instead of having one or more games built in. It was originally known as the Atari VCS, for Video Computer System, and the name "Atari 2600" (taken from the unit's Atari part number, CX2600) was first used in 1982, after the release of the more advanced Atari 5200. The initial price was $199 with a library of 9 titles.

Coleco Telstar Combat (1977)

Telstar Combat was one of Coleco's attempts to break away from the Pong-clone video game rut. It's certainly unique as no other company manufactured a dedicated console with such elaborate controls. The console plays four variations of a tank battle game, very similar to the Atari 2600 Combat game cartridge.

Magnavox Odyssey 2000 through 4000 (1977)

These Odyssey systems were more elaborate variations of the pong style video game which featured many colors and gameplay modes.

Magnavox Odyssey²(1978)

The Odyssey² was Magnavox first "second generation system, which was significantly different than the various Odyssey PONG systems. It was a computer with BASIC programming, but many people regarded it as a home video game console. It came with two controllers, RF switch with TV box, power supply, and the Speedway, Spinout and Cryptologic game cartridge.

The Odyssey² was the first home video game console to introduce what was to become the standard joystick design of the 1970s and 80s: a moderately sized black joystick unit, held in the left hand, with an eight-direction stick that was manipulated with the right hand. In the upper corner of the joystick was a single 'Action' button.

The area that the Odyssey² is best remembered for its pioneering fusion of board and video games: The Master Strategy Series.

Coleco Telstar Gemini (1978)

The Coleco Telstar Gemini featured offered 2 shooting games along with 4 pinball games. This console featured 2 flipper buttons on either side which simulated playing a real pinball machine. There is also a big red button on top which was used to launch the ball in to the play field. The button simulated a real pinball launcher, a short tap shot the ball out slowly and a long press shot the ball out faster.

Atari 400 (1979)

Designed primarily as a computer for children, the Atari 400 had an "advanced child-proof design featuring pressure-sensitive, wipe-clean keyboard". It featured a single cartridge port under the front cover.

The Atari 400 booted up into "Notepad", the only built-in program. Any other program was run from cassette or cartridge - this included the BASIC programming language.

Mattel Intellivision (1980)

Mattel Electronics released its Intellivision system nationwide in late 1980. Launched with twelve games, better graphics and sound than its competitors, and the promise to release a compatible keyboard that would turn the system into a home computer, the Intellivision faired well in the market, selling out its first 200,000 units.

Atari 5200 (1982)

The Atari 5200 was in essence an Atari 400 computer without a keyboard. The system featured many innovations like the first automatic TV switch box, allowing it to automatically switch from regular TV viewing to the game system signal when the system was activated.

The initial release of the system featured four controller ports, where all other systems of the day had only two ports. The system also featured a new controller with an analog joystick, numeric keypad, two fire buttons on both sides of the controller and game function keys for Start, Pause, and Reset.

Colecovision (1982)

The Colecovision is Coleco's third generation video game console, released in August 1982. It offered arcade-like graphics and controllers, and an initial catalog of 12 titles, with 10 more promised titles on the way. All told, approximately 170 titles were released on plug-in cartridges during its lifetime. The controller was a flat joystick, two side buttons, and a number-pad, which allowed the user to put inserts for customized buttons. The majority of titles in its catalog were conversions from coin-operated arcade games. The ColecoVision introduced two new concepts to the home video game industry - the ability to expand the hardware system, and the ability to play other video game system games.

By Christmas of 1982, Coleco had sold 500,000 units, mainly on the strength of its bundled games. While Atari's fortune had risen on the popularity of Space Invaders, Colecovision was the first console to feature the hit Donkey Kong, by Nintendo. The Colecovision's main competitor in the next-generation console space was the arguably more advanced but less commercially successful Atari 5200.

Nintendo Entertainment System (1985)

Following a series of arcade game successes in the early 1980s, Nintendo made plans to produce its own console hardware that had removable cartridges, a feature not included with the company's earlier Color TV Games product. Designed by Masayuki Uemura and released in Japan on July 15, 1983, the Nintendo Family Computer (Famicom) was slow to gather momentum: during its first year, many criticized the system as unreliable, prone to programming errors and rampant freezing. Following a product recall and a reissue with a new motherboard, the Famicom's popularity soared, becoming the best-selling game console in Japan by the end of 1984. Encouraged by their successes, Nintendo soon turned their attentions to the North American markets.

In June 1985, Nintendo unveiled its American version of the Famicom at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES). With a completely redesigned case and a new name, the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) proved to be just as popular in America as the Famicom was in Japan, and played a major role in revitalizing interest in the video game industry.

Sega Master Systems (1986)

The SG-1000 and Mark III were available in Japan in the mid-1980s, but when Sega witnessed the early success of the Nintendo Entertainment System, the company knew it wanted a share of the American console market. So, Sega redesigned the Mark III, renamed it the Sega Master System (SMS for short), and released it in 1986, not long after the NES first came out.

Technically, the Master System was superior to the NES, with better graphics and higher quality sound. The original SMS could play both cartridges and the credit card-sized "Sega Cards," which retailed for cheaper prices than carts but had less code.

See Also

• Video game
• Computer video games